Cold Winters
by rightlane
Summary: Ash and Serena need to keep each other warm during a cold night. Bonnie is a clever little kiddo.


**Cold Winters**

The chilly air blew right into the room. There was a slight motion underneath the covers, and a boy's head popped out. He had the most unruly hair, slightly tanned skin, and the tiredest brown eyes anyone's ever seen. He grumbled to himself as he reached up to close the window, and quickly retreated back into the warm blankets.

But he wasn't alone. There was a girl too, with a pink bow perched upon short honey-coloured hair, curled up into a ball as the breeze hit her before the boy closed the window. She mumbled to him, "Ash, get back here… I'm cold…"

He replied, "Serena? I'm coming, I'm coming… where's Clemont and Bonnie? I thought that they were going to be back in a day or two, at most three, from Snowbelle City to the Frost Cavern outpost. They're still not here…"

"It's okay, Ash. Come here! I'm getting cold, and you know you're getting cold too! Braxien and Talonflame are too tired to keep us warm, so I need you here with me! It's not… weird or anything, we just need to stay close together to keep warm!", the girl, Serena, replied. She opened her soft blue eyes, and looked at Ash with tired, but cloyingly grateful eyes as he crawled back under the covers with her.

It wasn't an awkward situation, because they'd be traveling so much together, but for Serena, this was easily the closest she's been to Ash. As Ash, shivering from the cold encounter of shutting the window, crawled back into bed, she felt so warm inside, though she was still cold. "Ash? Uhm… are you still cold?"

"Y-yeah. It is kinda chilly in here, isn't it…"

"H-here. Uhm… if you don't mind it… we can hug? It'll keep us warm!", she happily exclaimed. She quickly blushed and in her mind, realised that she just offered him a close, in-bed hug. She thought to herself, "No, no, no, it's just to keep warm, because if we're not going to keep warm together, we're going to freeze, and that's not good. No."

"Uh… sure! Actually, that's a great idea! Here, I'll come to you!", he replied with ragged breath. It was exhausting to move, especially when the outside had freezing temperatures. The building they were in didn't provide much protection from the intense cold, as it was made of logs and could barely keep out the moisture accumulated from the snow drifting outside.

He shimmied over to her, and wrapped his arms around her. She blushed intensely, and mumbled to Ash, "A-Ash? Uh… well… I… uh… I'm grateful that you're here!"

"I am too, Serena. I couldn't imagine what it'd be like if you were here to keep me warm! C'mere, I'm going to hug you even tighter, because I really am pretty cold!"

And with that, Serena blushed so much that she felt warm and tingly all over, keeping her warm throughout the entire night.

"Serena? Ash? Where are you?", a young girl's voice shouted outside the building. Ash and Serena couldn't hear her, because both of them were still asleep underneath the covers.

The door creaked open, and a small girl with electric yellow hair popped in. "Ash…? Serena…? Where are you?" She looked at the bed, and realised that there were two people underneath the blankets. She giggled, realising that her master plan worked.

Her fingers slowly crept up the blanket, and she started to slowly remove the blanket. There they were, Serena and Ash, hugging each other while sleeping because they needed to keep warm. Serena looked so happy, and Ash? Well, Ash just looked grateful that he survived a night of intense cold.

Clemont poked his head in as well. "Bonnie? Why'd you leave them in the first place? You know that I care very much about-" His sentence was cut by the rustling of the sheets as Serena started to wake up. She blinked her eyes, and realised that she was only about 3 inches away from Ash. Her eyes grew big, and she started to blush once more. She looked up, and saw Bonnie's smirking face. "Bonnie…? Oh! Bonnie! Uh, uh, uh, this… this isn't what it seems like! We were just hugging because it was so cold here yesterday!", she hurriedly exclaimed while trying her best to not wake Ash up.

Ash started to move a bit too, and blinked his eyes. He looked up, and smiled. "Hey Bonnie, did you get us the coats we needed?"

Bonnie replied with a cheerful grin, "Yep, Clemont has them! I also got something for Serena. She knows what I did for her, right?" She flashed Serena a devilish grin.

It dawned to Serena what Bonnie did. "Oh Bonnie. You clever little devil, you.", she replied with the biggest blush on her face.

Ash, who let go of Serena, looked at the both of them with a confused expression. "I don't understand what's going on. Serena, why are you blushing?"

"I-it's nothing! Nothing at all! I'm just glad that we spent the night together... to keep warm! That's all! Haha...", she bashfully replied.

Bonnie just smirked, and said to Serena, "I hope you're happy, Serena~"

Clemont stood near the door, and still couldn't make heads or tails out of the situation. Ash didn't understand, but gave Serena a hug anyway, and happily said, "Thanks Serena. I'm really grateful that you kept me warm last night, and if this ever happens again, well, you and I are going to be prepared, right?"

Serena blushed, Bonnie chuckled, and Clemont didn't understand.


End file.
